At 15:08 11/04/2011 +0100, Paul Bivand wrote:
>I think the dichotomy between 'making a point' and 'really wanting to win'
>isn't quite right.
>One may really want someone to win, but recognise that they are unlikely
>to do so.
Sure, but with FPTP, many people might be deterred from voting for such a
party because, being realistic, they realise that it would prevent them
having any direct influence over who _was_ elected. With AV, they could
have the best of both those worlds.
I still think, however, that many people who have never really considered
for voting for anything other than a 'mainstream' party candidate might
consider such a 'making a point' gesture with AV - but I may be
wrong. Provided not too many had the same idea, it wouldn't do any harm,
and it could be argued as good that the 'point they made' has gone onto record.
In trying to think about the consequences of AV (as compared with FPTP), I
actually wonder if it would make that much difference these days. Indeed,
considering the simple 3-party situation ('Left', 'Right' & 'Centre'), if
(as historically would have been the case) the 'Centre' party usually came
third in terms of first choices and if (as may well be true these days),
second choices of 'Centre party' voters split equally between the other two
parties, it would not make any difference at all to the outcome. When it
clearly does make a difference is if the 'Centre party' comes a fairly
close second in the first ballot - we then presumably have the
much-discussed situation of the 'Centre' party being very much favoured in
the second ballot.
As I intimated in my initial message, I think that before one can attempt
to express a preference for a voting system one really needs to decide
exactly what one would hope that the voting system would achieve - which,
as I said, I, for one, really can't decide!
Kind Regards,
John
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